“Everybody in retail is terrified of Amazon,” research analyst Sucharita Mulpuru recently told the New York Times. And with good reason.

Having expanded from books to nearly everything from dog food to digital e-readers, the online giant has taken another step to increase the menace for retailers. Responding to regulatory changes in some states that force shoppers on the site to pay sales tax, Amazon announced plans to cut shipping times, offering same-day delivery in some metropolitan areas. Walmart soon followed suit in testing same-day delivery, and eBay also got into the act.

Writing for Slate, Farhad Manjoo summed up the impact on smaller businesses: "It’s hard to overstate how thoroughly this [Amazon's] move will shake up the retail industry … If it can pull that off, the company will permanently alter how we shop. To put it more bluntly: Physical retailers will be hosed."

With high logistical hurdles to overcome, success for Walmart and Amazon is far from guaranteed. But is there any way for small businesses to compete if, virus-like, retailing giants mutate to achieve lethal same-day shipping power?

Real Over Right Away

Trying to beat Amazon and Walmart at the "everything instantly" game is clearly a losing strategy for the vast majority of businesses, but there may be other ways smaller firms can compete.

While the backlash against massive, impersonal commerce can result in an increased demand for things like grass-fed beef and seasonal vegetables, "real" and "local" aren't just watchwords for foodies. Fast Company insists this appetite for "real" products is much broader.

"More and more, people want to get to know what’s real and authentic to the culture and the people behind the products and services they use," wrote Mike Doherty. Smaller businesses can capitalize on this by re-conceptualizing limited selection as personal curation of products, offering an in-store experience with a human touch or even taking customers on "consumer safaris" to see where products are made.

Shipping the Real

Smaller businesses probably can't promise to ship as quickly as Amazon, but they can still leverage this love of "real" when it comes to delivery.

For example, simply by scrawling "Love -- Andy" in marker on a box containing a Halloween costume of the "Toy Story" character Woody (in the movie, Andy is the young boy who owns the talkative toys), the Disney Store delighted customer Chase Clemons so much he shared his great experience on the extremely well trafficked blog of his employer, 37signals, giving Disney a hefty dose of free publicity. Disney, of course, isn't a small business; but in its attention to detail, it showed the value of acting like one.

Or take another melding of "real" and delivery in London, where a service called Hubbub delivers goods from a selection of a customer's local shops. By banding together, small businesses that would struggle to manage deliveries themselves get to reach new customers. Hubbub makes a small fee and commission on each delivery and customers get to shop local with less hassle.

Getting something immediately is a rush, but there's more to the retail experience than that. And while Amazon may be able to offer same-day delivery, it can't offer the feeling of real.